commercial policy of Great Britain been more liberal, we may safely affirm that the present federal constitution had not been formed. Never was there a nation that so profited by the uses of adversity as the American people.*

In the latter end of the year he received a letter from Mr. N. Nicholas of Kentucky, making inquiry whether he was the author of the resolutions passed by that state, concerning the alien and sedition laws, and offered by his father, Mr. George Nicholas, to which Mr. Jefferson answers that he could have wished the subject to have remained, as hitherto, without inquiry; but, as Mr. Nicholas had a right to an answer, he would give one "as exactly as the great lapse of time and a waning memory would enable him."

As these resolutions were the first which broached the doctrine of nullification, as they have been known to have proceeded from Mr. Jefferson, and his authority has been relied on in support of that doctrine by its advocates, his history of these resolutions may throw some light on the still contested question, as to the real views and motives which prompted them. In his answer, dated December 11, 1821, he says:

* It is most remarkable, and it teaches a salutary lesson to both nations, that the active hostility of Great Britain has ever proved eventually advantageous to the United States; and on every occasion where her enmity to her transatlantic brethren has been conspicuous, it has mainly contributed to confer on them some great national benefit. 1. To her religious persecutions America owed some of her most prosperous settlements. 2. To her attempt to collect revenue from them, after enjoying the monopoly of their trade, they owed their independence. 3. Her commercial jealousy and restrictions, her withholding their forts, led to the formation and the adoption of the federal government. 5. Her depredations on American commerce, and her countenance of the Algerine made the American navy. 6. Her attack on the Chesapeake and impressment of American citizens gave to that navy a discipline, and a spirit of emulation and resentment which were essential to its success. 7. Her exclusion of our grain and other restrictions established our manufactures. 8. And lastly, the criticisms of her writers have stimulated our literary men, and are likely to improve both our literature and manners.

"At the time when the republicans of our country were so much alarmed at the proceedings of the federal ascendancy in Congress, in the executive and judiciary departments, it became a matter of serious consideration how head could be made against the enterprises on the constitution. The leading republicans in Congress found themselves of no use there, browbeaten as they were, by a bold and overwhelming majority. They concluded to retire from that field, take a stand in the state legislatures, and endeavour there to arrest their progress. The alien and sedition laws furnished the particular occasion. The sympathy between Virginia and Kentucky was more cordial, and more intimately confidential than between any other two states of republican policy. Mr. Madison came into the Virginia legislature. I was then in the vice-presidency, and could not leave my station. But your father, Colonel W. C. Nicholas, and myself happening to be together, the engaging the co-operation of Kentucky in an energetic protestation against the constitutionality of those laws, became a subject of consultation. Those gentlemen pressed me strongly to sketch resolutions for that purpose, your father undertaking to introduce them to that legislature, with a solemn assurance, which I strictly required, that it should not be known from what quarter they came. I drew and delivered them to him, and in keeping their original secret, he fulfilled his pledge of honour." He supposes that the imputations in the newspapers that he was the author, had proceeded from some unguarded intimations of Colonel Wilson C. Nicholas. He afterwards adds: only fact in this statement, on which my memory is not distinct, is the time and occasion of the consultation with your father and Colonel Nicholas. It took place here, [Monticello] I know; but whether any other person was present or communicated with, is my doubt. I think that Mr. Madison was either with us, or consulted, but my memory is uncertain as to minute details."

"The

.. Whatever might have been Mr. Jefferson's deliberate opinion about the power of the state legislatures to resist an act of Congress, which they believed to be unauthorized by the constitution, after he engaged in the investigation, it scems clear from the preceding account, that they contemplated nothing more at first than a course which all would now pronounce legitimate, that is, to take a stand in the state legislatures, and there endeavour to arrest the enterprises against the constitution. This was their purpose, and the alien and sedition laws furnished the desired occasion. Their means then contemplated, were not a withdrawal from the Union, or an amendment of the obnoxious laws, but "an energetic protestation against their constitutionality." How it happened that the term "nullification," which, though contained in Mr. Jefferson's first draft, was omitted in the first resolutions of Kentucky in 1798, but inserted in those of the succeeding year, has never been explained. The following extracts from Mr. Jefferson's correspondence shed some light on the subject, and lead us to the inference that after having drawn the Kentucky resolutions, he had, on more deliberate reflection, disapproved of the principle asserted in them.

...On the 17th of November, 1799, he writes to Mr. Madison: “I enclose you a copy of the draught of the Kentucky resolves. I think we should distinctly affirm all the important principles they contain, so as to hold to that ground in future, and leave the matter in that train as that we may not be committed absolutely to push the matter to extremities, and yet may be free to push it as far as events will render prudent."

Twelve days afterwards he wrote the following note to Colonel Wilson C. Nicholas: "The more I have reflected on the phrase in the paper you think it should be altered. invitation to co-operate the

shewed me, the more strongly I Suppose you were, instead of the annulment of the acts, to make it

an invitation to concur with the commonwealth in declaring, as it does hereby declare the said acts are and were ab initio null, void, and of no force and effect. I should like it better."

Mr. Jefferson thus concludes his letter: "I fear, dear sir, we are now in such another crisis, with this difference only, that the judiciary branch is alone and single handed in the present assaults on the constitution. But its assaults are more sure and deadly, as from an agent seemingly passive and unassuming. May you and your cotemporaries meet them with the same determination and effect as your father and his* did the alien and sedition laws, and preserve inviolate a constitution which, cherished in all its chastity and purity, will prove in the end a blessing to all the nations of the earth."

It is not a little remarkable that Mr. Jefferson should have persevered so long in the opinion that the constitution was in danger of being overthrown by the judiciary; the branch of all others which, supposing its powers of perversion to be so great, seems to have the greatest interest in its preservation. If the executive seek to alter or undermine the constitution, it will be by extending its power to objects now interdicted, or by prolonging the term of its own existence. If the legis lature have the same purpose, it will endeavour to attain it by a similar extension of its functions and sphere of action. But the judges, from the character of their office, as well as their greater harmony, must, upon every motive of self-interest, be disposed to check innovation, and to keep the constitution unchanged. They must know that in any revolu tion, or even radical change in the frame of civil government, many public functionaries will be pushed from their places,

*This letter is a further proof of those lapses of memory of which Mr. Jefferson in his last years furnished so many examples, and which it would have been far more remarkable if he had not exhibited. The father of George Nicholas died many years before the formation of the new constitution.

and none so likely as those who can neither originate the laws or rules of action, nor choose agents for their execution. These two great sources of influence over men's wills and acts, which constitute the political power of a state, is divided between the legislature and the executive; and the judiciary has as little share in the contest, and as little agency in determining the portion to be allotted to each, as the trumpeter in an army has in directing its movements, or in meting out to it the honours and rewards of victory. The judiciary can indeed do much occasionally as an auxiliary to the other branches, but it can do nothing for itself. Power supposes the exercise of discretion in granting or withholding favours, but the judge being governed by settled rules, is precluded from any such discretionary exercise of his authority: and if he does assume it, it must be either secretly or by an open abuse of power. In the first case, the act, as to exciting fear or favour, is essentially the same as if it had not existed; and in the last, besides the risk of impeachment, a judge would lose far more influence than he could gain. But the legislature has the legitimate power of voting or refusing millions, and the executive of distributing it among this set of men or that, either arbitrarily, or within limits to its discretion by which its power is not sensibly abridged.

Nor has the judiciary the same means of acting on public opinion as the other departments; nor even as much as the press or the pulpit. But whenever any measure or institution becomes on any account odious or objectionable-when it stands in the way of some favourite scheme, or when those who manage its concerns are objects of hostility, one of the modes in which it is commonly assailed is by representing it as exercising powers injurious to the public interests, contrary to the constitution, and dangerous to civil liberty. It is well known with what sensibility the ears of the American